Im with you on the overwhelming fanat. I am working on month two and I find it a bit nuts. I have just completed all the first annotated games and I am now working on the King Safety theory 1. Great stuff and I am loving it, but I wish I didn't have a job at this point.

Month 4 thins out a bit. If you look at the overview, it just basically fleshes out the material in Month 3. So I imagine the same holds for months 5 and 6. And we already heard that the last months are basically exercises and sample games. Which begs the question -- is it worth the hundred or so dollars to finish out the last 3 months?

M3-Opening preparation:I just finished 6.Bg5. I have to say I loved it. I used my mini board and played it out. On move 9...Qc7. I am sure I wouldn't use this. In the game as you will and have seen it went. 10.Qe2. I looked at:10.Bxf6 gxf611.exf6 Qe5+12.Be2 and I think white looks better. But that is just me.

Which begs the question -- is it worth the hundred or so dollars to finish out the last 3 months?

I actually see this completely the opposite way. For me it's not the theory and annotated games that take ages to work through but rather the exercises. I can go through an annotated game in an hour or so and then maybe go over it again a couple more times to make sure I grasp everything but working through a set of exercises takes me ages and ages.

Also I learnt far more from working through the practical exercises in Month 1 than I did from just reading the theory and annotated games and I imagine that was the same for most of us.

The last 4 months or so of the course will probably be the most valuable in terms of gaining real understanding providing we put the work in and do all the exercises and tests.

I agree with Mr Baggins here. The Months 10 to 13 are critical to getting the full value of the course. I personally think it is great value (but why they didn't get someone from a country where English is the first language, to correct the material is beyond me).

I am actually doing Month 10 now and this is where it all comes together. It seems to me very important to do many of these excercises so the thinking process they offer becomes routine during a real game.

The end of the course is the entire reason I joined. I look at the first eight months or sor as mere preparation for the real course.

As I insinuated at this post where I summarize some of Rowson's views, I joined this course because of those problems, and I want to tackle those problems because of something Rowson said:"I believe that the surest way to improve our results is to practice solving complex problems at home, and to do this as often as possible, in a timed and disciplined manner. This helps to make concentrating more habitual and therefore makes it easier for us to focus at critical points in our own games."

Rowson feels very strongly about this technique, saying "One exercise completed with full application for 20 minutes is easily worth an hour of playing through games."

Rowson is very critical of the overreliance in adult players of thinking in terms of words, stories, narratives. When we do that we end up imposing our pet theories on the position, rather than letting the position tell us what is the best move by doing concrete analysis.

Just started month 3, and i always feel surprised of learning basic things despite the fact i'm 1700 elo. I wonder how i could have ignored such principle before.

Just take the "rooks" pdf, for example i did'nt know the R+N perpetual check.

With rooks on the 7th rank case II, i almost post an errata, thinking Ra7 last move was incorrect because a1=Q, to notice later that Rxa8, Qxa8, Rh8 was winning the queen also.

Same for interposing a piece on the rook opened file to have tempo to double the rooks.

And so on, with the other "pieces quality" documents...

So for sure the exercises are a good plus, but the theory for players of my level is of great value. Most of the time, just seeing something i knew or guessed, written black on white on the paper, is pertinent.

Blue Devil Knight wrote:The end of the course is the entire reason I joined. I look at the first eight months or sor as mere preparation for the real course.

As I insinuated at this post where I summarize some of Rowson's views, I joined this course because of those problems, and I want to tackle those problems because of something Rowson said:"I believe that the surest way to improve our results is to practice solving complex problems at home, and to do this as often as possible, in a timed and disciplined manner. This helps to make concentrating more habitual and therefore makes it easier for us to focus at critical points in our own games."

Rowson feels very strongly about this technique, saying "One exercise completed with full application for 20 minutes is easily worth an hour of playing through games."

Rowson is very critical of the overreliance in adult players of thinking in terms of words, stories, narratives. When we do that we end up imposing our pet theories on the position, rather than letting the position tell us what is the best move by doing concrete analysis.

If you believe Rowson, then the final months are the real key to ICS.

Sound logical. There are two audio interviews by John Watson on ICC archives with Larry Kaufman, the developer of the chess evaluation function for Rybka. During the interview he makes the comment that it is not useful for less experienced plalyers to analyze their own games (without help) because they do not have the necessary knowledge to do the analysis.

I find it is best to annotate my games right after Playing them, then review my annotations with master/coach so they can correct or reinforce my thoughts/plans. Also after you get a few dozen games under review patterns start to develop. For instance I would miss tactics due to my reluctance to play positions that exposed my King. So I started playing the KID which also helped my positional understanding of King safety. This is just one example, but I would highly recommend aligning yourself with a mentor or coach.

I wish I could be so lucky as to have a coach. I am forced to analyse my games with an engine and guess/assume why things are right / wrong.

Luckily for me, most of my moves are agreed to by the engine, so I don't have to guess "why" that much.

__________________________________________Content will be assimilated.Resistance is futile.----

Blue Devil Knight wrote:The danger of studying positional chess at the expense of tactics is that you will spend a half hour thinking about where a Knight belongs, and then proceed to put it on a beautiful square where it is en prise.

__________________________________________Content will be assimilated.Resistance is futile.----

Blue Devil Knight wrote:The danger of studying positional chess at the expense of tactics is that you will spend a half hour thinking about where a Knight belongs, and then proceed to put it on a beautiful square where it is en prise.